March 5, 2023

 

Bear's Hump, Waterton

There are some very well known and special passages for today and as I read through them, I realized that they are linked together in the concept that through faith and belief in the Lord we will be blessed.

 

It starts with Genesis 12 where God is asking Abram to leave his home, his family and to go the land (Canaan) that God will show him.  Through Abram’s faith in God, he is to be blessed and he will be made into a great nation.  This is reflected in Romans 4 where Paul speaks of Abraham’s faith.  He “… believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.”  Paul goes on to say that due to Abraham’s faith in God, he became the father of us all  and that ”…the promise comes by faith, so that it may be by grace and may be guaranteed to all Abraham’s offspring”.  I believe that this is the promise given not just to Abraham but to all of us that God will be with us.  That God has the power to do what he promises (Romans 4: 21).

 

John 3 also reminds us that belief in the Lord is life-giving. The famous verse John 3:16 of course speaks of God so loving the world that he gave us his only son so that he might die for our sins.  All who believe in him shall not perish but have eternal life.  However, I love the next verse (John 3:17) where we are told that “God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him”.  We are not condemned; we are loved, and God wants to save us through our belief and faith in him.

 

Tying much of this together is a psalm that is dear to me.  Although I am sure that i heard it growing up, Psalm 121 really came to me when my mother died just over 35 years ago.  She wanted the psalm read at her funeral and, perhaps since it was important to her, it has become important to me.  It is very comforting to me and helps my faith and belief in God.  It is probably part of what brought me back to the church after a period during university and the early days in the working world when I didn’t attend or think much about church.  Losing my mother and seeing her struggling with her faith as she was fighting the cancer but then embracing it again before her death, made me realize how faith can help us. How it can strengthen us and help us through difficult times.

 

I will look up to the hills, I will look to the Lord, from whom my strength comes. He will watch over me, he won’t fall asleep on the job, he will be my protector.  He will keep me from harm, and he will watch over my coming and my going.  This is why Psalm 121 is so dear to me – it helps me believe, it reminds me that God loves me and that he will protect and keep me safe.  It is a reading I often turn to when I need a reminder that I am loved.

 

In conclusion, we should remember that if we have faith, if we believe in the Lord, He will be there for us, He will watch over us and He will keep us.  He is here not to condemn us but to save us. 

 

 

- Jacky Hall-Buckland